Babi Yar

Also known as Babyn Yar, Babin Yar, Babiy Yar

ravine in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv and site of Nazi massacres

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Babi Yar is a ravine in Kyiv, Ukraine, where Nazi forces carried out massive massacres during World War II, killing tens of thousands of people, primarily Jews. It remains one of the most significant Holocaust sites and a symbol of the atrocities committed during the war.

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Described at

Documentary Heritage of Babyn Yar - Memory of the World

The collection recorded the tragic history of Babyn Yar – the places of mass shootings of civilians and prisoners of war, which is linked to the Nazi occupation of Kyiv during World War II. The first took place on 29 and 30 September 1941, when nearly 34,000 jews were shot. Between September 1941 and September 1943, the victims of the Nazi occupiers in Babyn Yar were about 100,000 civilians of Jewish, Roma, Ukrainian, and other nationalities, red army soldiers, nationalist and soviet underground activists. In the post-war years, Babyn Yar suffered a man-made catastrophe, which occurred on 13 March,1961, when a powerful mudslide through the broken dam flooded the area of Kyiv Kurenivka and led to numerous casualties. With Ukraine's independence, Babyn Yar has become a place of remembrance for victims of Nazi crimes. The collection is an integral part of human memory and an indefinite warning against the dangers of hatred, racism, ethnic hatred, persecution and extermination on ethnic, political, religious or other grounds.

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Area: 41.5
Image: Babyn Yar. General view of the place of massacres.jpg

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Babi Yar (Russian: Бабий Яр) or Babyn Yar (Ukrainian: Бабин Яр) is a ravine in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv and a site of massacres carried out by Nazi Germany's forces during its campaign against the Soviet Union in World War II. The first and best documented of the massacres took place on 29–30 September 1941, in which some 33,771 Jews were murdered. Other victims of massacres at the site included Soviet prisoners of war, communists and Romanies. It is estimated that a total of between 100,000 and 150,000 people were murdered at Babi Yar during the German occupation.

The decision to murder all the Jews in Kyiv was made by the German military governor Generalmajor Kurt Eberhard, the Police Commander for Army Group South, SS-Obergruppenführer Friedrich Jeckeln, and the Einsatzgruppe C Commander Otto Rasch. Sonderkommando 4a as the sub-unit of Einsatzgruppe C, along with the aid of the SD and Order Police battalions with the Ukrainian Auxiliary Police backed by the Wehrmacht, carried out the orders. Sonderkommando 4a and the 45th Battalion of the German Order Police conducted the shootings. Servicemen of the 303rd Battalion of the German Order Police at this time guarded the outer perimeter of the execution site.